One dead in Rogers crash

February 5, 2004

PNT staff report

Police are investigating an accident that left one man dead and another seriously injured after the vehicle’s driver ran a stop sign in Rogers late Tuesday night, according to officials with the New Mexico State Police.
Juan Nieto, 18, of Chihuahua, Mexico, was pronounced dead at the scene. The driver, Gabriel Melendez Arzate, 28, of Causey, was flown to Lubbock Covenant Hospital.
Linda Arzate, Gabriel’s wife, said Wednesday night from Covenant Medical Center in Lubbock that here husband was in stable condition.
No citations have been issued in connection with the accident.
“We’re basically contingent on whether Mr. Arzate comes around and he’s able to give us a statement or not,” New Mexico State Police Capt. Oscar Gonzalez said. “That could be tomorrow; that could be a week or two.”
According to the police report, Arzate was traveling at a high rate of speed in a Maroon 1993 Chevy Cavalier bearing Kansas license plates on Roosevelt Road Seven when he failed to stop at the intersection of New Mexico 235. The vehicle slid off the road and fishtailed, hit a tree then flipped over in a ditch, the report states.
Gonzalez said both passenger and driver were not wearing a seat belt. Gonzalez said he is unaware if either man held jobs in the area.
Rogers is an agricultural community southeast of Portales.